


Protocol

by sebviathan



Series: if it's all right, then you're all wrong [1]
Category: Psych
Genre: Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Episode Tag, Episode: s03e08 Gus Walks Into a Bank, Late Night Conversations, M/M, Pre-Relationship, angst and complicated feelings and... hope?, gus isn't there but his shoes are, lassiter is melodramatic but he deserves to be, nuance for DAYS, shawn learns to drink his respect women juice
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-03-01
Updated: 2019-03-01
Packaged: 2019-11-07 06:51:15
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,608
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/17955650
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/sebviathan/pseuds/sebviathan
Summary: The night after the bank robbery, Carlton stops by the Psych office on his way home. It's the only logical end to the day he's had.





	Protocol

**Author's Note:**

> the original scene at the end of the episode is garbage, as is the rest of all of shawn and juliet's interactions in that episode, so i rewrote it with lassiter and also put it in a better version of the episode altogether! eat my ass steve franks

He shouldn't want to be here. He's already been jerked around  _enough_  today, and Spencer has very much to do with that. He  _should_ , frankly, be just as disinclined to see him as O'Hara currently is.

On most occasions, of course, Carlton would simply convince himself to some degree that he in fact  _doesn't_  personally want to be here... But he looks down at the pair of shoes in his hands and he can't find it in him to believe that he is in any way obligated to be the deliverer. Every single other hostage of the robbery will be allowed to claim their shoes and phones from the station tomorrow morning. Any reason for  _this_  to be different―it's not quantifiable. It's not outside of him. He's man enough by now to admit that.

God―standing outside the Psych office right now, he  _feels_  like this damn pair of shoes. Soggy from getting the military-grade tear gas washed out of them, and then tumbling around in an industrial dryer on high speed...

Spencer often makes him feel like that. He's used to it.

And goddammit, when it's all settled, he gets to come out of it clean, doesn't he?

 

"Hey, Spencer―" he calls out as he pushes the door open, taking advantage of the cold slap in the face that the November night air just gave him. Then, once he can actually  _see_  him, "...Evidence officially turned all of the hostage shoes over. I found Guster's. So―"

"You know what Gus's shoes look like? Just off the top of your head?" Shawn says before the man can even set them down. Or even before  _he_  can come all the way down from being startled. "Don't tell me you're one of those people who are into feet, Lassie."

"What? Ew,  _no_." Saying that was  _so_  worth the look on Lassiter's face. "His name is embroidered on the inside."

To prove it―as though it needed proving―Carlton promptly closes the distance enough to hand them over. And subsequently, to watch Spencer go through a facial journey of confusion, amusement, and sudden understanding.

" _Oh!_  That explains why he was  _literally_  crying on my shoulder about losing these... huh. Wonder why he didn't tell me."

"Maybe he was embarrassed," Carlton supplies easily.

"Probably," Shawn mutters, still focusing on the fancy little gold  _Burton Guster_  that probably cost a pretty penny to sew into his friend's shoes.  _Makes sense._

And Carlton, despite the relative calm in the man before him now, very vividly sees the man from earlier. The man whom he had to physically restrain from running straight into a bank robbery, who was so jittery and so obviously  _terrified_ , who was more vulnerable than Carlton had  _ever_  seen him, who was dedicated to seeking real justice even for the man who had made him so terrified in the first place, who has  _always_  so very clearly been dedicated to real justice and  _not_  just what is easy...

He wants to say something, but before anything at the forefront of his mind can slip out, Spencer  _thankfully_  looks up and opens his mouth.

"Hey, what's gonna happen to Phil? He won't―he's not gonna go to prison, right? Because... that would be stupid. The poor guy literally thought his wife would be killed if he didn't, and he never actually physically hurt anyone or even intended to―I mean, Christ, he had the safety on the whole time, and he's clearly been under an unimaginable stress  _already_  with his house being foreclosed―"

" _Spencer._ "

Lassiter snaps him out of it. He's wearing an odd expression when Shawn focuses on his face again. Like some kind of concern.

"Those... are all things that you can tell the jury when Phil Stubbins has his trial. You've proved your―" he struggles for a moment not to say  _psychicness_ ―"...reliability in court before, I'm sure you'll do it again, and with all the facts and the jury's sympathy at play, my guess is... at worst, Stubbins will spend a few state-mandated weeks in a psychiatric facility. He'd probably benefit from it, too."

"And until then?" Shawn is quick to fire back. He's starting to get those leg jitters again. "He doesn't have to spend the night in jail or anything, does he? I mean, with Phelps and Gresling being caught and everything, it wouldn't―"

" _No_ , he and his wife are staying out of a motel, Spencer," Carlton sighs.

The other man's intense capacity to  _care_  is a little exhausting in its own right, and at the same time... it keeps him where he stands. Draws him just slightly closer. Carlton can see it shining out of him and he doesn't want to see  _anything_  else.

As Spencer's mouth opens again, Carlton knows what he's going to ask, so he answers preemptively,

"Phelps and Gresling  _are_ , however, both going to be transferred to the county jail sometime tomorrow, and I have no doubt they'll each do at least twenty years―conspiring grand theft, kidnapping and what could be  _argued_  as attempted murder, blackmail, all the trauma inflicted  _combined_... yeah. Gresling's old enough he'll likely die in prison before he could get parole, and Phelps definitely won't be allowed any chance of parole to begin with, considering his history."

Oddly, even with the utter lack of emotion in delivery, Shawn can tell that Lassiter is trying to comfort him with that, that there is an intended unspoken  _and none of that would be true if you hadn't gotten involved, that poor man wouldn't have gotten justice and Phelps and Gresling would have gotten away with it, but you brought the day justice._ You _saw the truth. No one else could have._

There is of course no doubt between them, in the next moment, that it worked.

Shawn simply purses his lips and nods, then. That's good enough for him, until another thing comes to mind―

"What about Luntz?"

Carlton immediately breaks into a grin and leans into the nearest desk. "'Can't get the sewer smell out of his skin even after  _four_  showers,' according to O'Hara."

He hadn't realized, earlier, that Spencer had sent the bastard down into the stink of Santa Barbara's collective waste on purpose. He was too busy focusing on catching Phelps.

And  _then_  he was too busy hearing Spencer tell him  _good work, partner!_  in his head over and over again.

"You think Jules knows it was because of me?" Shawn asks after a moment, slowly dropping his own grin.

...And then, in the hours preceding this, Carlton was too busy listening to his  _actual_  partner rant about this one. It's just one of the many ways Spencer has been jerking him around, whether he actually knows it or not..

Carlton scowls.

"Do you really think for one second that she's dumb enough  _not_  to?"

With that, Shawn seamlessly sees Juliet in front of him.

 

_"Do you really think I need YOU to tell me what I 'owe myself,' Shawn? You really thought I didn't already know that―or that I in any way needed your PERMISSION? God, you―you really think that everything I do must have something to do with you, huh? If you ACTUALLY 'want me to be happy,' you'd have just minded your own business and maybe apologized for the way you've been treating me, like―like I have ANY more of an obligation to you than I have to any of my other friends! Because I don't! That is―if you even ARE interested in actually being my friend and not just the potential that I'll CAVE and date you someday, because with the way you've been acting lately, that's kinda what it seems like! God, Shawn, I―trust me, I don't like to be mean, but I honestly think you need to fucking hear it at this point: You are casual flirting and guilty crush material. You're NOT relationship material. Not for me or ANY woman until you grow up and realize that we actually―surprise, surprise―continue to exist when you're not around!"_

 

Having never heard anything even close to that much anger from her before, Shawn feels certain now that he screwed up big-time. He felt it earlier and he's feeling it again now, and something about being in Lassiter's presence is making it worse.

"Okay―fair enough, stupid question," he sighs, averting his gaze to the floor for a moment. There's a pattern in the carpet he never noticed before.

 _It sure_ was _stupid. And so was everything you said to her earlier,_  Carlton wants to say―to  _growl_  at him, really. But he knows that O'Hara certainly already made Spencer feel like a goddamn idiot, so much so that even  _after_  all of that, she still felt bad.  _He deserved it,_  he then reminds himself.

Whether Spencer deserves worse or not, though, Carlton decides against continuing along this train of thought. If only to keep it from becoming too obvious why he feels so strongly.

"...To be honest, she's not exactly happy with  _me_ , either," he tells him gruffly instead. Spencer's gaze snaps back to him. "But _also_  quite honestly, as far as Luntz himself goes, I don't feel the slightest bit bad. I really don't! And it's not even just because I already hated his guts―do you know that he has almost as many years of experience in law enforcement as O'Hara has been  _alive_? Yeah―he's almost twice her age! Her being into  _him_  I obviously can't comprehend to begin with but the REAL question is, why is  _he_  into  _her_?"

"Shit, because women his own age can actually tell that he's a fucking  _creep_ , I assume," Shawn answers, wide-eyed, to Lassiter's similarly wide-eyed and sharp nod.

"Ding ding ding! I've...  _tried_  to tell her, but she keeps insisting that  _she's an adult and can make judgments of character for herself_ ―and sure, she  _can_ , sure, it's not  _illegal_ , but I think the eleven years of life experience that I've got on her says pretty  _clearly_  that I know when an age difference is flat-out  _nasty_ , you know?"

He almost forgets where he is and whom he's talking to until he finishes―and then, after a split-second of some kind of panic, he decides that Spencer is in fact probably the  _only_  person willing to listen to him rant about this.

Though it still feels odd to be standing in the man's dimly-lit office, late in the evening, talking about something that they wholeheartedly  _agree_  upon.

It feels good.  _Too_  good.

Carlton realizes that he hasn't breathed since he stopped. Unbeknownst to him, neither has Shawn, but for an entirely different reason.

That is, he's been holding it, just  _waiting_  for Lassiter to say something comparing him to Luntz, to say that he's hardly less of a creep than that guy is, to even bring up  _him and Juliet_  at all... only to hear nothing of the sort. And to subsequently wonder, far moreso than why Lassiter hasn't... why  _he_  dreads it so badly.

For one very long second, the two of them are leaning respectively against the wall and a desk, and staring at each other in silence. Then Shawn hides his deep exhale in a cough.

" _I_  think that... as with all situations, Lassie, you should follow your instincts and take matters into your own hands. Send the bastard into as many sewers as you have to. Hell, just kick him right in the Little Camerons―unless that's..." He trails off, purses his lips, and clicks his tongue. "...against protocol?"

Carlton's exhale promptly comes out in an embarrassing wheeze of a laugh. Which he quickly covers up―"It isn't against any codes I know of, but it  _is_  unfortunately against regular laws..."

One thing he can't hide, however, is that his face has gone red. Being reminded of all the laws and codes he's willfully broken for Spencer's sake, not even just today but as a  _whole_... doesn't help.

Furthermore, being reminded of what truly gave him that final push earlier, of―

 

" _I know you don't like my methods―I know you don't like ME."_

 

...For all that he's often able to keep a level, unsentimental head in the middle of cases, all that Carlton could think of in that moment was that he simply could not take that. That―

_I have not, in the past six months alone, confessed my deeper feelings to his own mother, accepted a date to his high school reunion to purposely make him jealous, and self-sabotaged pretty much all of my own dates to NOW just stand back and let him believe that I don't even fucking like him._

God, he can't let himself do this now. He can't be feeling this way when it's just the two of them in Spencer's office in the dark, when it would be so easy to lose to an impulse―when his  _partner_  is so rightfully angry at the man across from him.

He should feel so much angrier than he does.

He should just  _leave_ , really―he's been here long enough, he's exhausted all points of relevant conversation, he's―

 _Starving,_  he realizes at the same time that Shawn does, because they can both hear it.

 

All the tension that he was feeling just a moment ago unwinds immediately as Shawn hops just slightly, and with an " _ooh!_ " takes a stride over to the box that controls his brand new zipline.

Carlton watches him press a button, and then has to step back as what looks like a miniature ski lift almost hits him in the head.

"I  _completely_  forgot about these," Shawn says as the hotdogs zoom in, and as he steps forward to grab one. "...Care for a lukewarm 'dog? You clearly haven't eaten since you left the bank―my treat. Also, coincidentally, the bank's treat."

It takes him a moment to register more than  _oh hell yes,_   _food_ , but after Carlton stuffs about half of a hotdog into his mouth and swallows most of it,

"Wait―they actually let you keep this thing?"

"Hell yeah they did! ...Well. I convinced the Chief to deduct whatever the price of it was from my next paycheck."

Shawn watches Lassiter check the whole zipline out, somewhat impressed, and neglects to mention that it likely wasn't very difficult to get at all. Obviously, strapped for time, whoever was tasked with meeting "Phil's" demands just went to some specialty tech shop and also got the metal caddy customized. He could have done all that himself even without a bank loan.

"Sadly," he does begin to admit after a bite of disappointingly cold hotdog, "it isn't a real representation of the truly  _revolutionary_  idea that I'd had... There's no food-specific capabilities, and there's one fatal flaw that I could never have anticipated."

Spencer looks momentarily very genuinely sad, at which Carlton raises an intrigued eyebrow.

"What's that?"

"Well, in order for the food to get on the line in the first place... I first have to actually  _put_  it there." Shawn sighs and shrugs and swallows. "Kinda defeats the purpose."

This is one of those situations where Carlton can't quite tell if Spencer is being serious or just doing a bit. Not even as he narrows his eyes and tilts his head, hoping to get some indication of the latter. Spencer does offer a slight smirk, but... but  _truly_ , the fact that he's unsure to begin with is enough to believe the former.

And while that normally wouldn't be a big deal, right now it's helping a lot of things occur to him at once. Like how accustomed Spencer is to having _everything_  handed to him.

Like how Spencer essentially wasted police resources―how, nevermind all the good he did today, nevermind that it was part of the overall plan to save Stubbins by buying time,  _nevermind_  that it's nothing compared to the bus or the plane... he still took advantage of a literal bank robbery to get this stupid zipline thing.

It doesn't rekindle much anger to remember all that, however, so much as it just puts Carlton's head back on straight. As straight as it was before he made the decision to come here, at least.

He then finishes off his last bite of hotdog and tells Spencer flatly,

"Eh, I'm sure that when you get bored of it in a few days, you could sell it right back to radioshack for maybe three-quarters the original price. And thanks for dinner, but I gotta get going."

"Oh!―of course you do," Shawn nods, trying to sound casual as Lassiter turns around. "'Course, it's late and you have cases and recordings of Reno 911 to catch up on and... yeah."

...So why is every step that the man takes closer to the door filling him with a deeper sense of panic?

"Actually  _wait_ ―"

He says that just as the door closes and keeps him from being heard, and he rushes out of the office with a desperation that seems to have come out of  _nowhere_  and catches him only feet away from his car―

" _Lassie_ , wait, I..." Now that he's here, hit with a short gust of cold air, he still doesn't know quite what he wanted to say. This sort of thing often just comes to him on the spot, but... he's distracted by the look on Lassiter's face. Underneath the surprise, he looks  _sad_. "I actually... um."

"...I  _would_  really like to get home and get some sleep, Spencer."

 _Then why'd he come here in the first place?_  a voice inside Shawn finally wonders.  _Why'd he_ really _come? It couldn't have just been to drop off some shoes._

And with that, he has it.

"Um―Jules didn't actually give me a chance to apologize before storming off," he says, somewhat raggedly as he grips the doorframe, "so I was hoping maybe you could tell her... that I know I've been acting entitled. Because I  _felt_ entitled and―I can honestly say I don't even know  _why_ , but I know it was bad and stupid and something that I  _will_  work on and do my best to change about myself because... I  _don't_  want to hurt... anybody. Least of all the people I care about."

He pauses to catch Lassiter's gaze, and then as soon as he sees the man about to open his mouth continues―

"And I  _swear_  that I don't―I mean, I know it's not an excuse, but I need you― _her_ , I need  _her_  to know... that none of what I've done means that all I want to do is date her or―or even, honestly, that I want to do that at all! Because the more I think about it, even with all the dumb advances I had to  _know_  it wouldn't go anywhere... I've just―I don't even know, I've just been doing what I thought any man  _does_. I've been forcing a whole dynamic just because it felt like... like  _a fun game_ , and I never stopped to realize how disrespectful I was being not just to her, but to everyone else around me. And... I guess, uh. Just let her know I completely intend to stop acting like that guy."

Lassiter hasn't moved from his spot or unfurrowed his brow since Shawn started. After a beat, though, his body seems to relax. He takes a slow step backward, toward his car.

"Trust me, Spencer, she'll let you know when she's ready to hear an apology. When she does, you can say all that to her face." Then, with the briefest smile before he turns around for the last time, "Good _night_."

Watching him drive off, Shawn can finally breathe. Rather than retreat back into the Psych office, though, he shuts the door behind him.

He could use a walk up and down the pier, he thinks. Just to keep the blood flowing.

 

*

 

 _"I told him he's irresponsible, immature, and absolutely not relationship material. God―I think_ you _told me exactly that over a year ago. I really should've regurgitated the words back at him a lot sooner..."_

 

Carlton hadn't responded at the time, but simply let her get everything out of her system. He wouldn't have had it in him, anyway. Not after the rollercoaster he went through himself.

He only  _just_  stopped going through it, he thinks.

Or maybe not even yet. He might just still be in a high point of his feelings getting jerked around, about to hit the other side of the wall any second now. Who knows.

One thing he  _does_  still know, if only in the back of his mind as he takes the scenic route home... is that part of him definitely went to the Psych office with something in mind. Part of him was holding onto Spencer's speech from earlier and was hoping for some kind of follow-up―for them to do what  _"let's screw protocol and get outta here"_  had immediately and  _surely_  by Spencer's design put into his head.

Which Carlton supposes makes it a little bit his own fault that he's been jerked around. He couldn't have just  _ignored_  the urge to go there, could he? And he couldn't just follow his damn instincts either. He just rode the line like a coward.

There are no  _rules_ for this, is his fucking problem. For almost three years, by this point, he's just made excuse after excuse for himself about why he  _can't_. Why he shouldn't even  _hope_.

Regardless of Spencer's apology (to O'Hara? to  _him_?), he still knows that he shouldn't.

 

Regardless of  _that_ , he still does.

**Author's Note:**

> and shawn's gonna spend the rest of the night vividly imagining all the ways that their talk could have gone different and blaming himself for screwing it up.
> 
> anyway
> 
> a universe where shawn just didn’t actually pull that bullshit to juliet about luntz at all, or where he’d ALREADY been told off and changed his behavior by now, or in which juliet had just actually been reacting realistically to him from the beginning and thus not inadvertently encouraged him to go beyond casual flirting in the first place… would also be very good. But I like the idea of shawn learning his lesson in this particular way, and i figured that if i was going to rewrite only the end of that episode, then the established events of it shouldn’t be THAT far removed from the original.
> 
> I also do think that the original episode COULD have also reasonably ended with lassiter, and assuming that lassie had been oblivious to shawn’s bullshit toward juliet, that ending could have happened more or less just like this minus all the angst. and ngl, I almost wish I’d written that version instead, bc this WAS stressful. But it was also cathartic in the end, and ultimately this is my ideal version of events that feeds into a more satisfying slowburn.


End file.
